Imagine you’re $100,000 in the hole on blackjack at Marina Bay Sands. Would you keep going or cut your losses? What if you finally hit the jackpot? For many who have invested time and their life savings to undergo fertility treatments such as IVF (in vitro fertilisation) or IUI (intrauterine insemination), the journey is nothing short of a roller coaster ride backwards in the dark.
At these high stakes, and with friends on their second or third child, it’s hard to not make subfertility your entire personality. The duality of life is ever present for IVF warriors who daily will themselves to focus on the positives while bracing for the soul-crushing odds. To undergo fertility treatments is to live in a multiverse of realities at any given time. It’s where the sweetness of life is blunted by invasive check-ups, mood-swinging medications and bills—only to be soothed by daydreams of one day hearing your child giggle or call you mama. In the same reality, each hormone injection is a shot of hope, and each egg retrieval procedure sees us counting our proverbial chickadees before they’re hatched, knowing full well of the abysmal attrition rate.
There’s ‘girl math’ but perhaps the cruellest of all, IVF math where eggs retrieved during a stimulation don’t always equal to live, mature or fertilised eggs, let alone genetically euploid or ‘normal’ embryos. During one stimulation cycle, embryologists shared that my batch of half-dozen eggs looked small and grey. Let’s just say if this was quality control Little Farms, they would not make the carton. And when all the eggs are finally retrieved, fertilised and put in deep freeze to be thawed and implanted back into our bodies one fateful day, this feeling of living in two realities doesn’t stop. In the dreaded ‘two-week wait’, the 14-day stretch between embryo transfer and a pregnancy test, our bodies become a metaphoric application of Schrodinger’s cat. Still, we hope.
Playing with a bad hand
“Premature grief and hope can be viewed as emotional states. This space in the middle represents anxiety and fear of the unknown,” explains Bhavani Deva, a registered clinical psychologist at Psychology Blossom on this uncharted middle ground.
“Only those undergoing infertility truly comprehend the emotional abyss of that life stage,” confesses Kimberly Unwin, co-founder of Fertility Support SG. “It feels like your life is at a complete standstill, consumed by the singular thought of how to have a baby. You start off with so much hope, but each failure chips away at that optimism, causing everything else in life to lose significance.
“The fear of imagining life without success becomes overwhelming and one that many women don’t even dare think about.”
“I went into treatments rather blindly not knowing anything. I was actually quite positive, thinking that I would succeed almost immediately. Little did I know that it actually wasn’t that simple. I only learnt about the low success rate of IUI after failing twice. With every hiccup along the way, my resilience waned, and with every failure, a part of my heart died. “Thankfully, there was also a part of me that kept telling myself to try again. With every failure, I made it a point to research more, to understand more and to discuss with my doctor on what we could do to get better results the next time and I felt that was what gave me the hope I needed, knowing there were still options that could be tried out to improve my situation.” Unwin, now a mother of three, rediscovered her joy and sense of self through supporting other women on their journey via Fertility Support SG and shares that having a personal outlet and hobbies in this time were instrumental in keeping her afloat. “The path through infertility is challenging, but you need not face it alone. Having support is not only important but essential for navigating this journey.”
Flush with hope
Sueann Yao, a financial consultant, always wanted children of her own. When doctors informed her that the odds of conceiving via IVF were low after having both fallopian tubes removed and an autoimmune disorder that affects pregnancy, she clung to the glimmer that “low doesn’t mean no”.
“With every failure I face, I tell myself it’s one step closer to success as my fertility specialist and I tweak the protocol to increase chances of success,” Yao, who began IVF at the age of 28 to admittedly higher success rates, says.
“I felt like a failure as a woman as I can’t conceive naturally and I was still failing multiple rounds of IVF. Doctors advised that even if I successfully conceived, staying pregnant would be difficult. However, I choose to cling on to hope and have a positive mindset as these are what I can control. As long as I put in my best effort, I won’t regret whatever happens.”
Ah, control. With every doctor’s visit and injection premeditated and carefully timed, IVF is all about masterful orchestration. But that’s where the illusion of control ends. Deva urges IVF warriors to focus on what’s within their control, such as “the choice to go ahead with IVF” while acknowledging what’s beyond anyone’s control, such as the results. “Embrace that this is a journey that involves many aspects that are beyond our control and predictability,” Deva reasons. “Let’s not give full power to our thoughts that can lead us to a negative thought loop. Instead, we can mindfully stay present in the here and now. We can empower ourselves by recognising the efforts we are taking within our control.”
Another psychological concept known as the ‘intolerance of uncertainty’ (IU) refers to our tendency to (naturally) react negatively to uncertain or ambiguous situations. Numerous studies over the years link people with high levels of IU with increased anxiety, stress and depression. Of course the brain, specifically, the prefrontal cortex, wants to minimise as much risk and uncertainty as possible to keep us ‘safe’. Sadly there is no such luxury when it comes to fertility treatments.
Sophie Sanders, a certified fertility support specialist and fertility yoga teacher, offers another perspective. “When we started IVF, our first purchase was books on a child’s first year. I also bought a Yoga Mama book and started learning about prenatal yoga,” says Sanders, whose IVF journey started at the age of 40—an age when the odds become statistically diminished. “After our first loss, those books went into the back corner of our drawers. We took it one milestone at a time and did one small empowered action in each moment.” Still on her journey to motherhood today, Sanders says that IVF taught her to “prioritise inner peace”. She spends her time on meditation and journalling, incorporating focused breathing techniques as part of her morning ritual.
“My favourite affirmations when negative thoughts come are: ‘I am safe. I trust the path that I’m on. I am willing to surrender to the outcome. I choose peace instead of this’.”
“Your journey with infertility may seem like an endless ordeal, and you may not know how or when it will end. But I promise one day, you will look back and realise it was merely a temporary phase. It was a journey that became your source of strength, making you realise that ‘If I can get through that, I can get through anything in life’!” Unwin muses.
This journey is bloody and fraught. There are no guarantees of a baby in your hands at the end of it. But one thing’s for sure. You will give birth to an entirely new being, and that someone will be you.
